The sport of rodeo has been around for a long time in this country, but it has become extremely popular in recent years. Indeed, the sport has become a sport enjoyed by amateurs as well as professional participants. The popularity of rodeo participation has grown to such an extent that many people practice for the various events using mechanical devices to simulate, for examples, riding on wild bulls or horses, roping animals such as calves or steers, and the like.
A number of practice devices have been proposed heretofore for practice roping, and they have met with varying degrees of success. However, such devices for practicing roping have generally only been made to look like a calf or a steer, but not to actually move like the live animal. Most such devices have only been towed by a vehicle or a horse, but did not have their own means of motive power. As a result, the devices have been somewhat restricted in their simulations, and did not provide the variety of practice techniques needed to accurately and realistically simulate the various roping events of a rodeo.
Any such device which is towed is, of necessity, tethered to some type of drive means, either a winch, a horse, a trolley, or the like. The tethering line itself presents significant drawbacks to the use of the device and hampers the mobility and variability of the device. But the drive arrangement or mechanism also presents drawbacks. Any towed device must follow the towing power, and any cable or other mechanical elements used present potential hazards to the roper using the practice device. The roper is usually on a horse, and any fall can be very dangerous to the person or the animal.
One early device is shown in U.S. Pat. No. 3,711,098 to McCord which provides a sled which is towed by a winch cable. A mechanism mounted on the sled allows the sled to travel in a straight, curved or zig-zag path as the winch retrieves the sled. Once the winch is completely wound up, the sled, i.e. the "calf," must be towed back to the starting point for repeated use.
Another prior device of similar type is shown in U.S. Pat. No. 4,136,874 to McCord. This device also is a sled which is towed, for example by a cable, and is vertically adjustable to simulate either a calf or a steer.
Still another roping practice device is shown in U.S. Pat. No. 3,974,799 to Parsons. This device is also towed along the ground, and iS caused to tip rearwardly when roped, so as to release the rope, and returns to normal position when towed further.
U.S. Pat. No. 3,947,033 to Bennett discloses another steer roping practice device which is mounted on wheels attached to a frame structure. The body of the steer is attached in such a way as to be able to lean to one side to more realistically simulate a steer. The device also includes an inertia motor, but this too requires an outside power source to build up the inertia until the device moves under the inertia power. This is generally a towing means.
Other towed or tethered devices are shown in U.S. Pat. Nos. 3,324,832, 3,776,553 and 3,802,706. None of these devices has been able to operate on its own power or move so as to realistically simulate a live steer or calf, and thus these devices all suffer from the same drawbacks.
On the other hand, U.S. Pat. No. 3,303,821 to Harris does show a mechanical cutting calf, which is self propelled and remote controlled. This device is driven by two reversible, electric motors each powered by a storage battery and each driving one of two rear wheels. By energizing both motors the calf is moved forward, but by reversing one of the motors, the calf is caused to turn one direction or the other. A plurality of solenoids are housed in the device and are selectively energized by a radio signal transmitted by an operator, for controlling the movement of the calf, and de-energizing all of the solenoids stops the device. Clearly, this device relies upon human activation to create any random movements of the calf, within the confines of the mechanical movement capability of the device.
Accordingly a primary object of this invention is to provide a realistic steer, calf or other such bovine roping practice device.
Another object of the invention is to provide a roping practice device in which the hind legs kick, and the front legs move, similar to a live animal.
A further object of this invention is to provide a roping practice device in which the size of the animal and its physical characteristics may be varied so as to be able to simulate not just a steer, but a calf or other bovine animal as well.
Still a further object of the invention is to provide a roping practice device which includes its own motive power source and which can be controlled by a computer controlled arrangement to enable random movement, more closely simulating a live animal.
Yet another object of the invention is to provide a roping practice device which can start, stop and turn either direction so as to enable a great variety of roping events, including calf roping, team roping, break away roping, bull dogging, and steer dodging.
These and other objects and advantages of this invention will become apparent from a detailed consideration of the following description and claims, when taken together with the accompanying drawings.